With an emotional opera thriller, the then 20-year-old Gioachino Rossini surpassed most of the popular Italian composers in 1813. Even though Tancredi is one of his early works, with its sweeping melodies and rushing finales it still shows Rossini’s musical creativity.
Amenaide has to obey her father’s wishes and marry a man, she does not love to help put an end to the power struggle between two rivaling families in her hometown. Only united one can fight the enemy – at least that is what is said. Amenaide, however, who in the meantime is deemed a traitor and threatened with death, loves Tancredi who returns home unknown. When he hears of the arranged marriage, he kills the rival. But his confident relationship to Amenaide is gone. Desperate, Tancredi wants to find death in battle.
PREMIERE 18 July 2024 – 7.30 p.m. Festspielhaus, Großer Saal
DURATION approx. 3 hours (with one intermission)
Melodramma eroico in two acts (1813) – Ferrara version
Libretto by Gaetano Rossi based on Voltaire’s tragedy Tancrède (1760)
